The Little Woman makes this dish and it is one of our favorites.
It has evolved over time. The original idea is lost in history, but
it may have come out of a Parade magazine. The recipe calls
for a lot of garlic but it mellows out in the cooking process to produce
a well-balanced chicken dish. Here’s why:

Garlic, as a member of the onion family, contains starch. When cooked,
some of the starch is transformed by heat into dextrin and free sugar that
sweeten the product, form browning and caramelizing compounds and mellow
the bite. But beware, this process can lead to burning if the cook
is inattentive.

A trained pallet will spot burned garlic or burned onion even in trace
amounts. We could never get away with it in school. The chefs
tasted it every time. So, take care not to burn onions or garlic
(or anything else, for that matter).

Note: 1. There is lots of salt in the soy sauce,
so don't add more.
2. You may wish to prepare this dish without bothering to debone
the chicken. It will save time in the preparation. Also, folks
tend to eat less if pieces are whole rather than bite sized.